Tuesday, January 20, 2015

One year ago today Hannah brought me what has to be the greatest bottle of coke of all time.

I was completely out of food and exhausted to the point of collapse. The coke was frozen solid. When I saw it I almost cried with joy. I took the coke and threw it into a pot of boiling water and got it all nice and hot. Then I packed it into my Canada Goose parka.

Later that day I pulled it out and it was still warm. It is cold in Antarctica, really cold. In the time it took me to unscrew the lid to the Coke it froze. I hadn't had any carbination for two months. I drank the Coke as fast as I could to get as much as possible before it froze solid. The fizz burned, and the slush was painfully cold. I was able to drink 3/4 of the bottle and then nothing else would come out.

Monday, January 19, 2015

We all know that obesity contributes to a lot of health issues like heart disease and diabetes. Also being inactive contributes to obesity. But it turns out that according to the study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition being active is of primary importance.

Just before Christmas I had someone come into the store and order a Garmin Vivofit, and so I decided to get one for myself to check it out. Basically it is a fancy step counter. A cool feature that fits in with the news story is the "move bar." If you are sitting too long the Vivofit notifies you that you need to get up and move. Also the Vivofit gives you a goal for how many steps to take each day. Make the goal and the next day it will set the goal higher. If you are having trouble hitting the goal it will reduce the goal to try and make sure you have something achievable.

I switched out my watch for the Vivofit. When my wife asked me about it, and expressed interest in having one I decided I wanted to move up to the Vivosmart. The Vivofit was nice, but I missed having an alarm on my watch and the Vivosmart connects to phones via Bluetooth. So I got a pair of Vivosmarts, one for me and one for her.

I really like the bluetooth features. The Vivosmart vibrates to letting you know of notifications

from apps like Facebook. It will also vibrate to let you know it is time to get moving. I can use the Vivosmart to control the playback of music, which I find convenient because frequently my iPod is stuffed inside a pocket or backpack while I am biking or walking. Also I can connect the Vivosmart to my Garmin VIRB camera.

So far I love the Vivosmart, but I really want an Apple watch. I guess I am just a sucker for Apple devices and the idea of a heart rate monitor that is in the watch instead of a chest strap is very intriguing.

Thursday, January 15, 2015

Currently working on an adventure plan for 2015. I'm excited about the prospects of filling this blog with a year of great adventures. I will be down sizing my bike shop to be able to execute my plans, and right now I am spending a lot of time working through that. This coming year should be great.